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Invoicing & inventory problem for my business.

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superboyac:
My business has a new problem.  We have a set amount of licenses for taking an online exam.  The license serial numbers and access codes are all set already (they are not going to be generated live).  I need a way to send an email containing the unique license information automatically when a payment is received.  The problem is that once a license is sent, it is "used up", and the next email has to use the next available license.  I don't know how to do this.  We use gmail apps for our business, but I also access it using the Bat.  I'm pretty sure it's not that hard to do, but I can't figure out a way.  It would have to work something like this:
1) Payment is received and my business receives the confirmation email.
2) As soon as that email is received, my business automatically sends the license email.  It'll be a standard template, but the the license fields need to be pulled from an excel sheet, or csv file, or something like that.
3) Once the license email is sent, that license is not available any longer.  The next license will need to be used next time.  So something like a counter needs to be built into this whole system.

How can I do this?  The bat has some interesting features in the quick templates, like the macro options involving cookies or attachments or something.  But it's the Bat so there is no documentation, and I have no idea what it can and can't do.

How do you programmers manage your software licenses?  Is there anything in what you do that I can steal?  Are there software license management tools for developers that I can shoehorn into this thing?

Thanks.
I'll pay for it also, but I'd rather buy an existing system because I figure I'll spend hours fiddling around with it, and if I have to pay someone per hour, it would be expensive.  We threw the idea at someone and were quoted $1500 with a delivery time of a few months.  I'd like this by early April  :( .  Any ideas are appreciated.  i googled around, but the keywords make it near impossible to find anything (license, software, inventory management).

db90h:
You need to learn the ins and outs of SQL database management. Store your licenses in a database. Check them off as they are handed out to users. If more needed added, there's an auto-increment integer type variable that can be used as an index, so you just add more.

When payment notification hits server, script processes license (doing whatever you need to do -- create a user account in my case, stored in the database, allocate activation code, log order, etc..). Then, script sends an email to the customer fulfilling the order.

Invoice or other systems are easy, breezy too. Lookup the order, if not readily available, and simply read a template file's contents into memory. Inside that template include things like __USERNAME__. Use a simple RegEx statement in whatever scripting language to replace appropriate variables with their true values. You just created something.

You'll likely run into caveats on the way, to which any experienced programmer can help. I recommend StackOverflow for programming questions. They will help you far better than I, or anyone here. There's a whole community falling over themselves to do your homework for you, or prove how smart they are ;p.

You could also use more complex setups, if needed.

Just make sure you fully understand what an SQL injection attack is before you even start to code for databases.

Update, Summary:


* Lean about SQL databases
* Learn about SQL injection attacks and other security issues
* Learn scripting. I still love PHP (this forum is written in PHP). It's a simple to use language that is very forgiving of syntax errors (almost too forgiving ;p). It lets you do things multiple different ways, so kind of conforms to whatever you already knew from some other language. Others may like .NET.
* Put it all together and learn ancillary skills like RegEx, or maybe XML for the Invoicing template .. and a bit of web administration, just so you know what's going on and can write secure code.

db90h:
And $1500 is standard charge for a software engineer. If I wasn't so busy, I might do it for $1000. Many don't realize the value of experience and knowledge. It's like a doctor or lawyer, requires extensive experience to have worked in the field, really understand it, and integrate multiple aspects of the field together -- instead knowing everything about one little piece. You can have it done a little cheaper I'm sure, but make sure their code is secure if you outsource to somewhere.

However, it's really easy stuff, programmatically, and will give you experience. Problem is, you really better understand security, and take it seriously. Like I said, SQL injection attacks is the first thing to learn to code against, and  will help you learn SQL.

I often joke it is a job of its own to manage my online systems. Of course, I do everything at my little company, about 10 peoples jobs, at least ;p. Web server setup and admin, order and license fulfillment, product programming and development, product documentation, support, marketing, sales, etc ... ;p. That is why I get so stressed out. I can't work much harder. Gotta be smarter.

mahesh2k:
If I understand your requirements correctly, here is something you need -

1) User asks for an exam with exam code and pays for it.
2) System pulls exam code and license number unique for that paid user and sends an email.
3) System removes the sold license from the specific (unsold license)  table and moves into sold table.
4) You get an email that license is sent to user (confirmation).

If this is what you want then the concept is very easy to formulate and not something you have to pay for hourly contract. You should get the quote of about 1000$ IMO, not more that that. If you need it quickly before april, I suggest getting hold of programmer from odesk or elance.

db90h:
And do understand that the programmer may give you a higher quote than he's willing to do it for. If you assure him or her that your requirements are simple and no sudden 'monkey wrenches' will get thrown into the plan, then you can probably talk them down.

However, I told you what you need to learn to do it yourself, and it is EASY. Your ability to write a paragraph tells me you are intelligent enough, IF you want to take the time to learn. If not, then hire somebody. You may get a superior solution from them for another reason: They may have pre-built code they can 'just use', which has been field tested, known to be secure, etc...

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